Water Board rejects funds release

The Indian Wells Valley Water District Board of Directors voted 3-2 Monday to reject the release of budgeted Water Supply Improvement Project Phase I funds for re-equipping Wells 18 and/or 34. Directors Chuck Cordell, Don Jo McKernan and Leroy Corlett cast the no votes.

By John V. Cianijciani@ridgecrestca.com

The Indian Wells Valley Water District Board of Directors voted 3-2 Monday to reject the release of budgeted Water Supply Improvement Project Phase I funds for re-equipping Wells 18 and/or 34. Directors Chuck Cordell, Don Jo McKernan and Leroy Corlett cast the no votes.General Manager Don Zdeba said the board, at its May 2012 meeting, approved the Water Supply Improvement Project contingent on the availability of funds and that a water-quantity and water-quality monitoring program be funded and established with the cooperation of the private well owners in the area of impact for a reasonable amount of time.“Even with approval, this project gives no authorization to district staff to solicit proposals or seek bids on the project,” he said. “The board needs a separate motion to approve the expenditure of funds necessary for each phase of the project.”He said a monitoring program is in place, and the district collected two sets of baseline data and asked the board to release the funds to proceed with Phase I.“What we’re proposing to do is start the work in September and complete by April of next year,” Zdeba said.Board President Peter Brown said this was the least expensive option.“In light of the 4,000-gallon-per-minute agriculture well within a mile of where these wells are, I think we really need to reassess what’s going to happen when we upgrade these wells to draw more water, what kind of effect the three of them are going to have on the aquifer,” said McKernan.He said when the board approved the project, the district did not have to deal with the agriculture well.“Now that we have this to deal with, it’s going to have an effect on the two wells that we have, plus we’re going to have some effect on that well,” he said. “With 1,200 gallon a minute, a well has a half-mile effect. When you have a well that’s 4,000 gallons a minute and one that’s 2,500 gallons a minute, they’re bound to have an effect on each other.”Cordell said when data is collected, it does not mean it is a done deal.“If the data shows a bad trend, we have to stop and reassess and go back to what we have right now,” he said. “This project has been going since at least 2005, and we keep finding and creating roadblocks where we never seem to get off dead center.”He said the monitoring program was put in place to collect actual data.“Let’s get down to the facts and deal with facts and not with theory any more,” said Cordell. “Models are good, but they only go so far.”McKernan said funds do not have to be released to collect more data.Brown said the WSIP has a protocol to follow if there is an effect.“There’s no way of knowing except for theoretical projections into the future of how this will work,” he said. “We spent $1 million dollars of rate payer money, and I understand your concerns. I can relate to it. I’m a private well owner too. We are stewards of the rate payers’ money. This is based on the need, not on increased demand. It’s just in case we have a problem. The point is this is redundancy for the system.”Director Don Cortichiato said the district and the board are tasked with serving 12,000 customers good quality water.“We’re also tasked with spending their money wisely,” he said. “That is what this WSIP is all about. A critical factor is that no one is saying we’re going to pump 24 hours a day, seven days a week. It increases capability to meet critical needs.”